Dokumentaren i Danmark 2008/1

Det begyndte med en klump i halsen og en lille tåre i øjenkrogen, da 1500 tilskuere klappede i et par minutter efter at have set Pernille Rose Grønkjærs mesterværk ”The Monastery”. Instruktøren var på scenen i Beograds store koncertsal, hvor filmen blev vist som én af de ”Magnificent7”, de syv enestående film, som var udvalgt til denne ganske særlige festival. En dansk, tilsyneladende lokal film om en gammel mand og hans ruin af et slot, som han vil gøre til et kloster – fik alle de roser, som den har fortjent.

Instruktøren var mange år om at lave denne film, og der vil sikkert gå mange år før der kommer én til af den slags, på det internationale niveau. Der er store forventninger til denne instruktørs næste film, som der er til de andre danske dokumentartalenter, som ikke præsenterede nye film i 2008 – Eva Mulvad, Phie Ambo, Jeppe Rønde og Max Kestner. Ligesom der ikke var nye film fra Anne Wivel, Jørgen Leth og Jon Bang Carlsen, for at nævne de tre store navne, som alle har lange imponerende filmografier at skilte med.

Til gengæld viste Anders Østergaard igen sit professionelle håndelag, denne gang med ”Burma-VJ”, som vandt den store festival idfa i Amsterdam, ligesom Nanna Frank Møller med sin dokumentarfilm nr. 2 ”Let’s be Together” igen pegede på sit indlysende instruktørtalent. Det er vel disse to film fra 2008, som har international klasse, med mindre (det gør man på dfi’s hjemmeside) de i 2007 premieresatte tælles med: Jon Bang Carlsens flotte comeback ”Purity Beats Everything”, Michael Noers herligt vilde ”Vesterbro” , kærlighedshistorien fra Chile ”Solange on Love” af Tine Katinka Jensen og Mikala Kroghs ”Everything is Relative”. Men : der har været bedre år end 2008.

Nu er der jo ingen, der siger at alle danske dokumentarfilm skal kunne gøre sig udenfor landets grænser, så ihvertfald tre andre fine, tematisk lokale film skal nævnes her (som de ovenfor omtalte er alle beskrevet på filmkommentaren.dk): Ulla Boyes film fra Kofoeds Skole ”Kun med hjertet kan man rigtigt se”, Cæcilie Holbek Triers generationsberetning ”Tomme rum” og Mads Kamp Thulstrup og Carsten Søsteds ”Og det var Danmark…”, som pt lanceres voldsomt og fortjent på dvd. Foto fra sidstnævnte.

http://www.dfi.dk/NR/exeres/848598CE-39F7-46CF-953C-B66290D62B21.htm

Dokumentaren i Danmark 2008/2

Her på redaktionen prøvede vi at starte en debat om DFI’s støtte- og distributionspolitik. Jeg prøvede at sige, at DFI forsømmer at udvikle FilmKunsten til fordel for den journalistiske dokumentar – og såvel kollega Allan Berg og jeg havde indlæg omkring dokumentarens evige problem: hvordan kan man komme til at se dem.

Det journalistiske blev tilbagevist af DFI’s konsulent Dola Bonfils, som dog mere end antydede, at DFI skal samarbejde (Brian Mikkkelsens opfindelse) med de to tv-stationer, som har fået tildelt øremærkede filmpenge. Og jo ingensomhelst forpligtelse har overfor filmkunsten i Danmark. TV vil have serier, som giver seertal. Resultatet har været  – med få undtagelser – dokumentar i tv-format om danske emner.

Med hensyn til distributionen har DFI etableret den udmærkede og fremadrettede ”filmstriben”, som er et tilbud til skoler og biblioteker, som kan downloade film til brug på stedet. Der er bare lige det, at bibliotekernes lånere IKKE kan låne filmene med hjem eller downloade på egne computere i hjemmet. Retten til såkaldt home video ligger hos producenterne, som kan få støtte til udgivelse hos DFI, men hvem skal så tage sig af det praktiske? Resultatet er at mange film slet ikke er tilgængelige for private. Kollega Allan Berg mener at det er producenternes fejl, at de ikke gør noget ved det, de tænker kun på penge, jeg drømmer mig tilbage til et langt liv i Statens Filmcentral, hvor det offentlige – som med bøger og musik – sørger for at offentlige støttede kulturprodukter var tilgængelige, hvorend i landet du bor. Vi arbejder på sagen, siger DFI… og producenterne hører man ikke fra.

Til gengæld skal der kippes med flaget for det ellers gennem året konstant udskældte DR: Hver tirsdag kl. 20.30 blændes der op for nyskabelsen ”Dokumania”, navnet på det strand, som DR har startet – verdens bedste dokumentarfilm vises her, annoncerer redaktionen på hjemmesiden, og det ser lovende ud i starten, hvor det er engelsk-sprogede film, der har fyldt fladen + et par danske. Hvis de vil finde film fra andre sprogområder, kan de jo bare bladre i filmkommentaren.dk! Foto fra ”Jesus Camp”, vist på Dokumania.

http://www.dr.dk/dr2/dokumania

Agnes Varda: Les Plages d’Agnès

From le monde 16.12.08, a clip from the review of Jean-Luc Douin, for our French reading readers, about a film that previously was praised briefly by my colleague Allan Berg:

”Toute mémoire est en désordre, toute sensation difficile à capturer, et ce type de défi délicat à relever entre pudeur et affichage de l’intime. Le projet d’Agnès V. ne pouvait prendre sens que si elle lui trouvait une forme appropriée, une cinécriture qui lui ressemble. “Peut-on reconstituer quelqu’un ?, dit-elle. Le côté puzzle me plaît.”

Va pour le puzzle, le kaléidoscope, et même plus que cela. Il faut prendre ici le projet de “tout déballer sans pour autant tout dévoiler” au sens visuel. Cet autoportrait est à la fois un résumé biographique et un patchwork de ses techniques esthétiques, usant de la photographie, de l’extrait de films, de l’installation et du dispositif via cadres, miroirs, trucages, bricolages, costumes, décors, parenthèses et digressions. Varda y fait les puces dans son bric-à-brac, elle fait la glaneuse de moments privilégiés, elle chine, flâne, filme et s’amuse : “Faire un peu le clown me convient et m’a permis de prendre du recul.””

France, 110 mins., 2008

http://www.lemonde.fr/cinema/article/2008/12/16/les-plages-d-agnes-agnes-varda-reconstitue-le-puzzle-de-sa-vie_1131771_3476.html

Sight and Sound: The Best of 2008

The highly estimated film magazine Sight & Sound has made its hit list for 2008, to be published in the January 09 issue. Winner is Steve McQueen’s Hunger. This is a clip from what the editor Steve James wrote about the procedure: We asked more than 50 writers around the world which five films seen in 2008 most impressed them (they didn’t all stick to the number). Their answers include more than 150 different titles made in the last two years (and at least 20 more made earlier). Only a cynic would say that the wide choice must reflect a weak year, with our writers looking for consolation prizes. The reason for this large number is surely because cinema is now so rich in variety that opinion is diffused…

To be noticed from a documentary point of view are the many titles that are included from this genre. Among them the following, all written about or reviewed on filmkommentaren.dk: Of Time and The City (Terence Davies), The Lie of the Land (Molly Dineen), Man on Wire (James Marsh), Waltz With Bashir (Ari Foldman), The Beaches of Agnes (Agnes Varda), Z32 (Avi Mograbi).

Can’t help quoting the editor again on his choice of The Lie of the Land, as I agree completely:

The most affecting film about England (with all due respect to Terence
Davies) that I saw this year. So powerful is its gentle examination of
the often brutalising lives of farmers that it’s capable of changing
minds on such divisive issues as animal welfare, fox-hunting and
vegetarianism.

http://www.bfi.org.uk/

Sourav Sarangi: Bilal

Bilal is a boy, whose parents are blind and have a hard life in a poor area of Calcutta. For a year the director has followed the little boy stumbling into the world as any other child does, who is not born with a silver spoon in hand. He has a smaller brother, who has to suffer from some beatings of the older Bilal, as small brothers normally do. It is laughter and crying, shouting and teasing, and learning in school and at home, where the blind parents do an unbelievingly beautiful job to bring up two seeing children. The father had a phone booth close to home, but it was closed and he ended up having heavy debt but they cope, probably due to help from the family that lives – literally – next door, and due to the return to serving a public street phone seems to happen.

The director manages to lift this film from being just-another-film-about-poverty to something universal about childhood to identify with, told from a humanistic point of view, where you can not help fall in love, as the director did, with the boy who ends the film having a circumcision done – ”they cut my dick”, he says to his father. Banal you might say, yes it is, as the observational documentary is at its best. With a calm rythm where you almost sense the days just going on and on, as they do for a child and his family. And thematically I got to think about the trilogy about Apu, by Satyayit Ray. I wish all the best for Bilal, and please follow him with the camera in the years to come!

The film had its premiere at idfa 2008. Supported by Jan Vrijman Fund and YLE.

India, 2008, 92 mins.
souravsarangi@hotmail.com
http://www.millenniumfilm.fi/tbr_bilal.html

Claus Bohm: Tiden er Guds hemmelighed

… har undertitlen ”en film om forfatteren Leif Hasle”, om hvem filmen sig drejer, en sympatisk og beskeden ældre herre, som instruktøren lader komme til orde, og han har mange kloge reflektioner at byde på, først på en rejse tilbage til hans barndomsby Århus og så i forskellige sammenhænge i by og på land, i mange tilfælde med fin oplæsning fra hans romaner, som har besættelsestiden som tema, men som rummer både fortid og nutid.

Med andre ord, en behagelig introduktion til et forfatterskab, jeg ikke kendte til, loyalt formidlet af Claus Bohm, som har gjort det til sin genre at introducere gode kunstnere, som ikke rammer kultursidernes forsider.

Problematikken, fra en filmisk synsvinkel, ligger i måden hvorpå Bohm kombinerer sine billeder – han fotograferer selv – og teksterne. Undertiden bliver teksterne meddigtende og fortolkende og får sit eget liv som i en ordløs sekvens med en mariehøne, der udforsker verden. Men undertiden bliver sammenhængen for bastant, et ord fremsiges og vi ser, hvad ordet rummer. Bohms stil kræver en høj grad af præcision og stramhed og den er ikke til stede hele vejen igennem. Hvorfor skal vi f.eks se ligegyldigheder som Hasle på café og restaurant. Men lyst til at læse en af hans bøger fik jeg nu.

www.multivers.dk
www.leifhasle.dk
    

D. Taylor Black: David Farrell’s Elusive Moments

This documentary is an inspiration for people, who deal with, work with or like to watch a photographer at work and listen to his thoughts about what he is doing and why and how. The documentary has for me too many words, and I could have done without some few scenes where people say how good David Farrell is, but those are details that a critic has to say in order to get to the point – that Farrell invites us generously to share the many projects he has worked on and is working on, as well as his dilemma (as any creative documentarian) to get into a market that is main-stream, tough and money-orientated. Logically the last sequences of the film shows him as a teacher, who teaches (which he must be good at, my remark from seeing this film) to have a steady income and then go and make his photos as he wants to.

The quality of Taylor Black’s work lies comes from the simple fact that he has followed Farrell for years and that he takes his time when he is with him in the Irish landscapes and in Italy, in Lugo, a place that I want to visit having seen the photos of Farrell. He says himself that the cities he saw was like Fellini, I would say Olmi, the fog, the emptiness, the has-been atmosphere.

The technical side is also touched upon. He shoots on film material, he loves the development process, he shot 900 pictures during 12 days in Italy, he has to edit them, this is where the work starts he says. Does it ring a bell, you documentary observers out there?

Ireland, 64 mins. 2008

Volha Nikalaichyk: Khash

An envelope arrived with a dvd. Posted in Lithuania by Volha Nikalaichyk, a woman from Belarus, producer of documentary films, and many times a participant in workshops in Eastern Europe, outside her own country, where I also met her once, years ago, in Minsk, capital of Belarus, a country led by Lukashenko. I had no idea about the content of the dvd but guessed that it could have something to do with Yuri Khashchavatski.

It had, Volha – calling herself one of Khash’s disciples – had made a film about her master, the film director who turned 60 last year and has made more than 30 films, many of which deal with life in Belarus and the tough militant dictatorship of the president, as seen for instance in ”The Square” that has been texted about on filmkommentaren.dk

In this wonderfully unpretentious film (title written on the dvd: Cinema and Cutlets) with Khash (nickname) and his very close friend, the singer, actor etc. Zhora Melski, the two of them go shopping and return home to prepare a meal which is inspired – as I got it – by the native town of Khash, Odessa. The director talks us through the film with clips from his films, those that were, and the ones to come, among them ”Searching for Yiddish”, where Khash declares his love to the painter Soutine, and in general to why he makes documentary films: to learn about something new, not to preach. My films are not political, he says… well, you taught me about Belarus and Chechnya (”Prisoners of Caucasus”) but I want to see more of your films. In other words, a retrospective must be organised for this important documentarian, a man who enjoys Life, as the film shows. Thank you Volha.

Bramafilm, 2008, 70 mins.
Lon7volha@gmail.com

1/2 Meter of Berliner Bratwurst

… yes, you can buy that in the streets of Berlin, ready for the xmas holidays as this wonderful city is, markets all over, too many sausages for my taste but also glühwein and chocolate and marzipan and beer, economic crisis… not visible, at least not when you walk the streets around Wittenberger Platz and enter into KaDeWe, Kaufhaus des Westens. Consume and more consume. You are part of it. You enjoy and dislike at the same time.

But Berlin is also two K´s for the moment, both to be found at Neue Nationalgallerie – Paul Klee and Jeff Koons. Klee, who had his big artistic development between two wars, presented with a huge and very exciting exhibition showing his refined, colour balanced philosophical and often very humourous work, and Koons the Sunnyboy, who acts like the showman he is according to the rules of the market. The dog, the heart and so on, we know them all. No crisis for his market, it seems.

And Bertolt Brecht is not out of fashion as the Robert Wilson edition of ”Die Dreigroschen Oper” at the Berliner Ensemble runs for full houses, with an enthusiastic reception, lots of fun, relevance of today? Well, dont we have a lot of Mackie Messer’s who survive any crisis whatsoever? And Brecht as intelligent entertainment is always relevant, is it not?

Sarkozy (1)

… is the name of the hyper active French president, very much disliked by the French film people I know, for his law proposal, his ”réforme de l’audiovisuel” that (according to le Monde 18.12) now has passed through the Parliament to be further discussed at the Senate from January 7. The opposition was very much against the proposal, some even comparing his move to how Berlusconi and Putin control the media.

The idea of Sarkozy is 1) to make France Télévisions into one enterprise with for example one overall documentary unit for the involved France 2, 3, 4, 5, to 2) have the President (c’est moi!) appoint the Presidents of the channels, to 3) take away commercials from the channels from 8pm to 6am with a total disappearance of commercials from 2011. The financial compensation is to be made up by a tax on commercials from the commercial channels and electronic operators plus a guarantee from the state that runs until 2011. The executive council of France Télévisions has already decided to follow the president’s commercial proposal.

What all this means for the creative (and critical) documentary in a country that has always been at the foreground when it comes to the financial support for the arts – I will ask some French documentarians for their comments. Will a lot of people be fired? How will the decision making be if there will only be one unit for documentaries? Centralisation? Will the foreseen raise in budget/income for the commercial channels mean a fall in financing for documentaries on the public channels? And so on, so forth… Voilà!